


La Tigresse

by MercuryGray



Series: The Royal Tigress [4]
Category: Turn (TV 2014)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-07
Updated: 2016-05-07
Packaged: 2018-06-06 23:04:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6773911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MercuryGray/pseuds/MercuryGray
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Caleb reports on events in New York to his superior officer, and Ben doesn't know what to think about anything any more.</p>
            </blockquote>





	La Tigresse

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Borrowed Robes](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6434860) by [MercuryGray](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MercuryGray/pseuds/MercuryGray). 



> A little while ago I wrote a little story for Montmartre-Parapluie about what would happen if a certain OC of mine met Caleb while he was in New York. One of the immediate outcomes of that story was the thought that Caleb would eventually have to report this meeting to his superior officer.
> 
> So here’s the follow up to Borrowed Robes – and the explanation why Lavinia’s story collection here on AO3 is called The Royal Tigress.

“I don’t believe you.“

It was several days after Monmouth, the army was finally off the march and in camp, and in the wake of his extended absence, Caleb was finally getting a chance to tell Ben what had transpired in New York.

Though that was not going quite as well as had been expected.

Caleb rolled his eyes, threw up his hands and rose, angrily, from his chair. "Jaysus, Ben, it’s the God’s honest truth!  I couldn’t make a story like this up!”

Ben sat back in his chair and ran a hand through his hair, considering the report in front of him and allowing himself an eye roll of his own. “Caleb, this reads like a…like…I don’t even know what! A novel, maybe – a very bad one, too. I can’t report this!”

“Believe me, Tall-boy, if there was a different version, I’d tell it,” Caleb assured him. “But I couldn’t make this up – I wrote it down exactly as it happened.”

“So you want me to tell Washington that a woman of means who met you on the street and…and  propositioned you gave you intelligence that Washington’s person was in danger from people close to him?”

Caleb threw up his hands and shrugged. “Tell him what ye like, Ben, but that’s the truth! And it ain’t changing!” He paused and reconsidered. “And it wasn’t just a proposition, it was…” He gave a small shrug, smiling a little at the memory. “A little more than that.”

Ben made a face and audibly groaned, knowing full well what Caleb meant, and the older man threw up his hands again and stormed out, clearly considering the meeting finished. Ben looked at the report in front of him and sighed for what seemed like the tenth time that day. He couldn’t show Washington this.

The tent suddenly seemed stuffy, and he fastened his cloak on, walking quickly outside and walking in whichever direction seemed to have the least people who might stop him and ask him for something.

They’d played this game often as children, Caleb and Samuel and Ben – two truths and one lie, and the trick to winning was to make the lies sound most often like the truth. Ben as the youngest had always been at a disadvantage, too used to trusting his elders to be able to reason out what was least likely to be true. And that skill had always eluded him – especially with Caleb, who lived a life so extraordinary sometimes as to be something out of a book. He knew he was too trusting of people - It was a virtue he was trying to unlearn. And Caleb had a knack for exaggeration – and the uncanny ability to know a good mark on whom to practice.

So what to believe?

When he reached the river his breath was fast and his heart pounding, and he took advantage of a fallen tree to sit down and watch the current for a while.  Was Caleb lying? He’d lied about such things before. Perhaps he had made the whole thing up to make the trip sound like less of a loss.

“Major ….Tall-madge?” The voice was heavily accented, and French, and young, which could mean only one person – the Marquis de Lafayette.

Ben hadn’t spoken much to the Marquis since his arrival earlier that year – what he knew of him came from Washington, or his ADCs, with whom he spent a great deal of time, since they were some of the only people in camp who spoke French fluently enough when he arrived. Ben had spoken with him perhaps once or twice, knowing only that he was young (younger even than Ben) and that he could trace his lineage through blood and through his marriage to some of the noblest families in France. And eager – he knew that, too, for Washington spoke often about it, in the way that one speaks of a son who wants too quickly to be given the responsibilities of adulthood.

“I see you ‘ave found a thinking post,” the Marquis said, sitting down next to Ben as the intelligence officer moved over on the log to make room. “It’s a nice view, _ne c'est pas_?”

“Very,” Ben agreed, looking out over the river.

“I think your…friend, Monsieur…Breuser, and you 'ave 'ad a… _petit bagarre_.” He searched for the word a minute and then, not finding it, clenched his fists and pantomined throwing a few punches. Ben tried not to laugh and nodded.

“Something like that.” He glanced at the younger man and smiled briefly. Who would Lafayette tell – Hamilton? Laurens? They already read his intelligence reports anyway. “My friend sometimes tells stories that aren’t – true. To make them sound better. And I think he’s doing that now, but he swears he isn’t.”

“Ah.” The Marquis considered this a moment. “Why do you think 'e is lying?”

“He’s telling me that while he was…away, a very attractive woman – a…Lady Montrose – met him, seduced him, and then gave him information about…a military matter. And he expects me  to - ”

The Marquis was squinting, as if he might hear better with focused eyes, but his face opened wide as he listened to what Ben was saying, cutting him off mid-sentence to ask, in agitation, “What did you say 'er name was? _La dame_?”

“Montrose,” Ben repeated, wondering what use the name could be. “Lady…La….Lavinia Montrose.”

Gilbert’s eyes went wide. “La Tigresse.”

Ben looked at him, amazed. “What you – you know this woman?”

The Marquis looked at him and smiled, the kind of look a friend gives another of his friends to whom he is revealing a particularly good secret. “Monsieur, the entire court at Versailles knows this woman. And it is probably fair to say that she ‘as… _known_  …the entire court.” He raised his eyebrows, so Ben might catch his meaning. “She is… _pas un courtesan, pas un demimonde, mais une_ …” The Marquis was struggling with his English again. “She is… _un dame en titre_ , a lady with a title, _mais aussi_ …she…is very beautiful, you understand, and she uses…that…to get what she wants. Information. _Les secrets._ ”

Ben’s eyes went wide. “You mean she’s a spy?”

The Frenchman didn’t seem satisfied with his explanation – or Ben’s interpretation of it.“ _Oui, mais…non_. She is… _un seductrice._ She collects information, and she…uses it. Sells it. Secrets, trade agreements, codes – 'er 'usband is a banker. She is a dangerous woman, monsieur. If your friend met her and lived, that is good, but you must hope she did not get anything out of ‘im. She is…very clever. A spy works for someone – La Tigresse est pour La Tigresse.“

"So she might…ask a random stranger into her house, and bait him,” Ben clarified, the wheels in his mind working quickly.

“She might find it _amusant,_ ” The Marquis agreed. “Especially if she thought 'e 'ad…something to 'ide, per'aps?”

Ben nodded, wondering, suddenly, about something. “Why do they call her the Tigeress?”

The Marquis had to smile again at that. “She 'as _le cheveaux rouge, monsieur, – comme_  Monsieur ‘amilton, the red hair, yes? – and _ses yeux sont tres engagentes_ – 'er eyes are…'ow you say…like you cannot look away? And she is an 'unter. She is… _un mangeur d’hommes_.” He smiled at that comparison, before adding, for Ben’s benefit,  “An eater of men. _Comme une tigresse_.”

 _Well, that sounds like the same woman,_ Ben thought to himself, internally congratulating Caleb, now that he’d heard more, on making it away after the more than slight temptations of this woman. “I wonder why she’s here,” he said aloud.

The Marquis murmured in agreement. “I remember it was said she was the mistress of Sir Thomas Gage – the military governor, _ne c’est pas?_ ”

“But he was recalled to England,” Ben remembered. The Marquis shrugged.

“She likes _la chasse_. I don’t think she would enjoy belonging to one man for too long. She gets…bored.”

Ben considered the women he’d known in his college days, the daughters of the professors and the merchants of New Haven, and the farmers’ girls in Wethersfield where he had taught – flirtatious, to a one, but never as the Marquis was describing this woman, who seemed dark and dangerous even in description. He didn’t know he could ever describe any one of them as being ‘bored’ with a man’s affections – but then, he hadn’t pursued any of them, either. He studied the younger officer next to him, taller and leaner in his newly made major-general’s regimental jacket. Plenty of the women in camp laughed behind their hands when the handsome young Frenchman rode by. Another thought sprang to his mind. “Did she ever try for you, Marquis?”

The younger man laughed. “I was a child when she was at Versailles - too young for her. But I watched ‘er play my brother officers in the Musketeers at a party once. She was…” he smiled again and shook his head. “ _Incroyable_. The kind of woman you watch knowing she is bad for you, no? Even at sixteen I saw that. You watched ‘er and pitied the man she chose to tease – and wanted ‘er to eat you, too.” He rose from the log. “I know you are Le General’s intelligence officer, Monsieur Tallmadge, which is why I tell you these things. La Tigresse _est dangereuse_ – and she plays for herself. Per’aps she is on the side of _les Anglais, mais_ …per’aps not. But you may not ever know. Anything that comes from ‘er should be suspect. It may not be your friend ‘oo is lying.”

“Thank you, Marquis,” Ben said, looking up and smiling at the young man.

He nodded in farewell, and left Ben to his thoughts and the beautiful view, considering the possibilities of beautiful female spies with questionable loyalties – whom, from what the Marquis had told him, played the game better than he did already.

Lady Lavinia Montrose. La Tigresse.

Doubtless a name he’d never hear again – but then, perhaps he would, if she courted the great and powerful. Perhaps she was already in places like those where Culper Junior was hunting for intelligence – perhaps they’d already met. Should he warn him? Or was it better to leave him in the dark? Culper Junior was a cautious man and given to good judgements when it came to character – and Ben appreciated that. If he gave such a  warning, he might sacrifice something he could still use. But if she’d tempted Caleb – well, but anything would tempt Caleb.

But still there was the question, the damnable question, that had been haunting him all morning, since he’d asked Caleb, flippantly, why he’d allowed himself to be so taken –

_What would you do with such a woman, Major, if she were at **your** disposal?_

**Author's Note:**

> I know Gilbert's arrival in this story was a little convenient, but I really would like to see how he and Ben interact -- if, like Arnold, Ben dislikes Lafayette because of the fatherly attention and affection given to the Frenchman by Washington. I didn't explore that quite so much here, but it's a interesting perspective to consider.
> 
> And I just like writing Lavinia's backstory. This is the first Lavinia story in which she herself is not present -- we hear about her solely from other people.


End file.
